When he signed here we all acted like it was some kind of coup....that there were still people left of GGE that didn't know a guy that hit for low average, but with pop, was more valuable than a .290 hittin' slappy....

A 35 dinger cat was available because, A. he's absolutely worthless at the plate save the 30 or so times he "hits somethin'" (From the adage, "swing hard in case you hit somethin'") and B. His worthlessness at the plate is worth more than anything else he does. They keep playing that guy at a corner - so close to the action, he's gonna hurt himself anyway.

They got him for a decent number cause he stinks. He's a guy that ain't touchin' 500 PA's on a good team.

Bring a guy in that stinks, and then he stinks, well, in a way he's fufilled his obligation.

leadpipe wrote:When he signed here we all acted like it was some kind of coup....that there were still people left of GGE that didn't know a guy that hit for low average, but with pop, was more valuable than a .290 hittin' slappy....

A 35 dinger cat was available because, A. he's absolutely worthless at the plate save the 30 or so times he "hits somethin'" (From the adage, "swing hard in case you hit somethin'") and B. His worthlessness at the plate is worth more than anything else he does. They keep playing that guy at a corner - so close to the action, he's gonna hurt himself anyway.

They got him for a decent number cause he stinks. He's a guy that ain't touchin' 500 PA's on a good team.

Bring a guy in that stinks, and then he stinks, well, in a way he's fufilled his obligation.

I think that we acted like we wouldn't have to watch Casey Kotchman anymore.

And he had 538 PA last year for a Baltimore team that made it to the ALDS.

You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves-----Abe Lincoln

Let me tell you, if any of you douchebag empty headed stuffed suit nanny politicians tries to fuck with my bacon, I’m going after you like a crazed chimpanzee on bath salts. -----Lars

leadpipe wrote:When he signed here we all acted like it was some kind of coup....that there were still people left of GGE that didn't know a guy that hit for low average, but with pop, was more valuable than a .290 hittin' slappy....

A 35 dinger cat was available because, A. he's absolutely worthless at the plate save the 30 or so times he "hits somethin'" (From the adage, "swing hard in case you hit somethin'") and B. His worthlessness at the plate is worth more than anything else he does. They keep playing that guy at a corner - so close to the action, he's gonna hurt himself anyway.

They got him for a decent number cause he stinks. He's a guy that ain't touchin' 500 PA's on a good team.

Bring a guy in that stinks, and then he stinks, well, in a way he's fufilled his obligation.

I think that we acted like we wouldn't have to watch Casey Kotchman anymore.

And he had 538 PA last year for a Baltimore team that made it to the ALDS.

Was about to post this but Al beat me to it.

I don't think anyone was getting a committee together to throw a parade down Euclid after we signed Reynolds. We knew what we had. A dude who Ks a lot but hits right handed with some power and will probably get you 30-35 HRs from the right side and is not Casey Kotchman. On a fairly cheap one year deal.

And that's what we got for the first 2 months of the season, save for a few weeks there where he made us hopeful thatwe may have lucked in to something more. If you think everyone was head over heels for Reynolds like he was our answer to Miggy, that's just not the case. If you don't believe me, check out my timeline for opening day. Peeps were ready to cut him.

The problem is forthe last month he hasn't even been what we expected. He's been arguable the worst player in baseball in June, with vitually no explanation.

He'll probably regress, just like he was bound to regress after his hot start. don't know if we have time to wait for it to happen. This is brutal

I'll agree with motherscratcher here. (I just wanted to type motherscrather in a sentence!). People thought I was obsessive in my criticism of Stubbs pre-season. I stand by it. Guy is a horrible offensive baseball player. Still is. If he can hit .240 batting 9th with a .290 OBP, I guess he won't kill you hitting 9th as he can run and play D. Reynolds same thing. He's having a Mark Reynolds year this year. Last 3 years...batting averages.... .198, .221, .221

So far in 2013 Mark Reynolds is batting .221, holy crap, it's the exact average he had in both 2011, and 2012!! When a guy with a history of 200 plus strikeouts in full seasons comes your way, with his recent batting averages, what he's going through right now is SOP. He'll hit over 30 homers I'm guessing (though he's fallen behind that pace slightly) and he'll hit about .220-.230 which is right where he is. He's Mark Reynolds. Drew Stubbs is Drew Stubbs. They're both incredibly limited baseball players who do 1 thing well....Reynolds hit ball far, Stubbs run fast which helps outfield D.

leadpipe wrote:When he signed here we all acted like it was some kind of coup....that there were still people left of GGE that didn't know a guy that hit for low average, but with pop, was more valuable than a .290 hittin' slappy....

A 35 dinger cat was available because, A. he's absolutely worthless at the plate save the 30 or so times he "hits somethin'" (From the adage, "swing hard in case you hit somethin'") and B. His worthlessness at the plate is worth more than anything else he does. They keep playing that guy at a corner - so close to the action, he's gonna hurt himself anyway.

They got him for a decent number cause he stinks. He's a guy that ain't touchin' 500 PA's on a good team.

Bring a guy in that stinks, and then he stinks, well, in a way he's fufilled his obligation.

I think that we acted like we wouldn't have to watch Casey Kotchman anymore.

And he had 538 PA last year for a Baltimore team that made it to the ALDS.

Mark Reynolds still needs six RBI to catch Casey Kotchman's production from last year.

Oh, six will be no problem for him to get? He's had seven RBI since May 24.

leadpipe wrote:When he signed here we all acted like it was some kind of coup....that there were still people left of GGE that didn't know a guy that hit for low average, but with pop, was more valuable than a .290 hittin' slappy....

A 35 dinger cat was available because, A. he's absolutely worthless at the plate save the 30 or so times he "hits somethin'" (From the adage, "swing hard in case you hit somethin'") and B. His worthlessness at the plate is worth more than anything else he does. They keep playing that guy at a corner - so close to the action, he's gonna hurt himself anyway.

They got him for a decent number cause he stinks. He's a guy that ain't touchin' 500 PA's on a good team.

Bring a guy in that stinks, and then he stinks, well, in a way he's fufilled his obligation.

I think that we acted like we wouldn't have to watch Casey Kotchman anymore.

And he had 538 PA last year for a Baltimore team that made it to the ALDS.

Mark Reynolds still needs six RBI to catch Casey Kotchman's production from last year.

Oh, six will be no problem for him to get? He's had seven RBI since May 24.

Shoot at that pace, he'll surpass Kotchman in mid-late August no problem!!

leadpipe wrote:When he signed here we all acted like it was some kind of coup....that there were still people left of GGE that didn't know a guy that hit for low average, but with pop, was more valuable than a .290 hittin' slappy....

A 35 dinger cat was available because, A. he's absolutely worthless at the plate save the 30 or so times he "hits somethin'" (From the adage, "swing hard in case you hit somethin'") and B. His worthlessness at the plate is worth more than anything else he does. They keep playing that guy at a corner - so close to the action, he's gonna hurt himself anyway.

They got him for a decent number cause he stinks. He's a guy that ain't touchin' 500 PA's on a good team.

Bring a guy in that stinks, and then he stinks, well, in a way he's fufilled his obligation.

I think that we acted like we wouldn't have to watch Casey Kotchman anymore.

And he had 538 PA last year for a Baltimore team that made it to the ALDS.

Was about to post this but Al beat me to it.

I don't think anyone was getting a committee together to throw a parade down Euclid after we signed Reynolds. We knew what we had. A dude who Ks a lot but hits right handed with some power and will probably get you 30-35 HRs from the right side and is not Casey Kotchman. On a fairly cheap one year deal.

And that's what we got for the first 2 months of the season, save for a few weeks there where he made us hopeful thatwe may have lucked in to something more. If you think everyone was head over heels for Reynolds like he was our answer to Miggy, that's just not the case. If you don't believe me, check out my timeline for opening day. Peeps were ready to cut him.

The problem is forthe last month he hasn't even been what we expected. He's been arguable the worst player in baseball in June, with vitually no explanation.

He'll probably regress, just like he was bound to regress after his hot start. don't know if we have time to wait for it to happen. This is brutal

AAAnd Baltimore couldn't wait to get rid of him. OK,do we have to do this? It's POSSIBLE he plays full time for a winning team. At the conclusion of his career, you will find his full time seasons predominantly with LOSERS.

And, I would argue if your goal was to exceed Casey Kotchman's production, you coulda damn near rolled out any hump that ever played the game - and some that didn't. Getting better than Casey Kotchman last year still gets you jack-shit, as evidenced by what we're seeing.

Look, I've mentioned in previous posts how it was commendable that at least they tries this off-season, and that anything was better than Kotchman. None of this really applies to the point that overall, Mark Reynolds is a pretty bad player. Again, they brought in a bad player, and they got one.

And Al, do you want Mark Reynolds getting 500 for this team? If he does, they gonna win?

I said when Mark Reynolds was signed the Indians should set up a wind farm in the outfield to make some money off of all the wind generated by Reynold's swings-and-misses.

I haven't posted in this forum much this season because I wasn't sold on most of the FA signings and we all knew the starting pitching was questionable. I watch most games, but I've turned the last two games off in disgust.

Despite now having a quality manager, this remains a team put together by Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dumber.

*Cue 3,000-word rant on how much I think Mark Shapiro and Chris Antonetti suck donkey balls*

leadpipe wrote:When he signed here we all acted like it was some kind of coup....that there were still people left of GGE that didn't know a guy that hit for low average, but with pop, was more valuable than a .290 hittin' slappy....

A 35 dinger cat was available because, A. he's absolutely worthless at the plate save the 30 or so times he "hits somethin'" (From the adage, "swing hard in case you hit somethin'") and B. His worthlessness at the plate is worth more than anything else he does. They keep playing that guy at a corner - so close to the action, he's gonna hurt himself anyway.

They got him for a decent number cause he stinks. He's a guy that ain't touchin' 500 PA's on a good team.

Bring a guy in that stinks, and then he stinks, well, in a way he's fufilled his obligation.

I think that we acted like we wouldn't have to watch Casey Kotchman anymore.

And he had 538 PA last year for a Baltimore team that made it to the ALDS.

Was about to post this but Al beat me to it.

I don't think anyone was getting a committee together to throw a parade down Euclid after we signed Reynolds. We knew what we had. A dude who Ks a lot but hits right handed with some power and will probably get you 30-35 HRs from the right side and is not Casey Kotchman. On a fairly cheap one year deal.

And that's what we got for the first 2 months of the season, save for a few weeks there where he made us hopeful thatwe may have lucked in to something more. If you think everyone was head over heels for Reynolds like he was our answer to Miggy, that's just not the case. If you don't believe me, check out my timeline for opening day. Peeps were ready to cut him.

The problem is forthe last month he hasn't even been what we expected. He's been arguable the worst player in baseball in June, with vitually no explanation.

He'll probably regress, just like he was bound to regress after his hot start. don't know if we have time to wait for it to happen. This is brutal

AAAnd Baltimore couldn't wait to get rid of him. OK,do we have to do this? It's POSSIBLE he plays full time for a winning team. At the conclusion of his career, you will find his full time seasons predominantly with LOSERS.

And, I would argue if your goal was to exceed Casey Kotchman's production, you coulda damn near rolled out any hump that ever played the game - and some that didn't. Getting better than Casey Kotchman last year still gets you jack-shit, as evidenced by what we're seeing.

Look, I've mentioned in previous posts how it was commendable that at least they tries this off-season, and that anything was better than Kotchman. None of this really applies to the point that overall, Mark Reynolds is a pretty bad player. Again, they brought in a bad player, and they got one.

And Al, do you want Mark Reynolds getting 500 for this team? If he does, they gonna win?

Do we have to do this? I don't know. I'm not even sure what we're doing. And leaving aside the fact that Reynolds has played on teams over .500 for more than half his career now, I'm not sure what you think you know about the guy that everyone else here doesn't. Mark Reynolds is Mark Reynolds and he is doing Mark Reynoldsy things.

leadpipe wrote:When he signed here we all acted like it was some kind of coup....that there were still people left of GGE that didn't know a guy that hit for low average, but with pop, was more valuable than a .290 hittin' slappy....

A 35 dinger cat was available because, A. he's absolutely worthless at the plate save the 30 or so times he "hits somethin'" (From the adage, "swing hard in case you hit somethin'") and B. His worthlessness at the plate is worth more than anything else he does. They keep playing that guy at a corner - so close to the action, he's gonna hurt himself anyway.

They got him for a decent number cause he stinks. He's a guy that ain't touchin' 500 PA's on a good team.

Bring a guy in that stinks, and then he stinks, well, in a way he's fufilled his obligation.

I think that we acted like we wouldn't have to watch Casey Kotchman anymore.

And he had 538 PA last year for a Baltimore team that made it to the ALDS.

Was about to post this but Al beat me to it.

I don't think anyone was getting a committee together to throw a parade down Euclid after we signed Reynolds. We knew what we had. A dude who Ks a lot but hits right handed with some power and will probably get you 30-35 HRs from the right side and is not Casey Kotchman. On a fairly cheap one year deal.

And that's what we got for the first 2 months of the season, save for a few weeks there where he made us hopeful thatwe may have lucked in to something more. If you think everyone was head over heels for Reynolds like he was our answer to Miggy, that's just not the case. If you don't believe me, check out my timeline for opening day. Peeps were ready to cut him.

The problem is forthe last month he hasn't even been what we expected. He's been arguable the worst player in baseball in June, with vitually no explanation.

He'll probably regress, just like he was bound to regress after his hot start. don't know if we have time to wait for it to happen. This is brutal

AAAnd Baltimore couldn't wait to get rid of him. OK,do we have to do this? It's POSSIBLE he plays full time for a winning team. At the conclusion of his career, you will find his full time seasons predominantly with LOSERS.

And, I would argue if your goal was to exceed Casey Kotchman's production, you coulda damn near rolled out any hump that ever played the game - and some that didn't. Getting better than Casey Kotchman last year still gets you jack-shit, as evidenced by what we're seeing.

Look, I've mentioned in previous posts how it was commendable that at least they tries this off-season, and that anything was better than Kotchman. None of this really applies to the point that overall, Mark Reynolds is a pretty bad player. Again, they brought in a bad player, and they got one.

And Al, do you want Mark Reynolds getting 500 for this team? If he does, they gonna win?

Do we have to do this? I don't know. I'm not even sure what we're doing. And leaving aside the fact that Reynolds has played on teams over .500 for more than half his career now, I'm not sure what you think you know about the guy that everyone else here doesn't. Mark Reynolds is Mark Reynolds and he is doing Mark Reynoldsy things.

Not sure what "fact" I'm leaving aside.

Mark Reynolds has had over 500 PA 5 times in his career. 82-80/70-92/65-97/69-93 and last years 93-67, again a year where they couldn't wait to get rid of him, and brought Machado up to an unfamiliar position because he and Betemit where averaging an error like every SEVEN chances, or something silly like that.

And I don't think I know what other people don't. It should be crystal clear that "Mark Reynoldsy" things, aren't gonna help good teams.

By the way, he's a horrible fit in THIS line-up especially. As I mentioned in the spring, strikeouts from individuals are fine - but when you get too many on a TEAM, especially in an offense lacking a stud or two, you're gonna get hit with long peiods of nothing. Right now you got too many guys you wouldn't bet a dime could get a guy home from third with less than two, or move a runner with a productive out. If Reynolds was in a lineup of guys that could handle the bat, but were short on pop, Christ, let him go in there and take his porn hacks - I guess. But here, he just adds to the aggravation.

Hopefully the point is moot, and they get decent production from others, cause "decent" is enough to keep him out of the line-up. If he's in there, that'll tell up about the status of Chizzy and some of the other prospects.

Mark Reynolds has had over 500 PA 5 times in his career. 82-80/70-92/65-97/69-93 and last years 93-67, again a year where they couldn't wait to get rid of him, and brought Machado up to an unfamiliar position because he and Betemit where averaging an error like every SEVEN chances, or something silly like that.

And I don't think I know what other people don't. It should be crystal clear that "Mark Reynoldsy" things, aren't gonna help good teams.

By the way, he's a horrible fit in THIS line-up especially. As I mentioned in the spring, strikeouts from individuals are fine - but when you get too many on a TEAM, especially in an offense lacking a stud or two, you're gonna get hit with long peiods of nothing. Right now you got too many guys you wouldn't bet a dime could get a guy home from third with less than two, or move a runner with a productive out. If Reynolds was in a lineup of guys that could handle the bat, but were short on pop, Christ, let him go in there and take his porn hacks - I guess. But here, he just adds to the aggravation.

Hopefully the point is moot, and they get decent production from others, cause "decent" is enough to keep him out of the line-up. If he's in there, that'll tell up about the status of Chizzy and some of the other prospects.

It's a fact that Mark Reynolds has played, and usually started, on mostly winning baseball teams. And it was awfully convenient for you to leave off his rookie year where he played in 111 games and had over 400 AB so you could leave off the 93 win season of Arizona.

And it's also cool that you throw out Machado as if he's some sort of replacement player or something. The dude is a 20 year old phenom 1st round pick Baseball America top 15 prospect for 2 years running. He's not a schmoe who the Orioles settled on because they hated Mark Reynolds so much and were looking for any alternative. Of course, maybe the Orioles should have moved Reynolds over to 1B. Who's the stiff they have over there now?

Mark Reynolds strikes out and hits home runs. That's what he's always done and that's what we expect him to do. And he could absolutely do that on a winning team. The problem is when he stops doing the later of those two things, which, much to our collective consternation, he seems to have stopped doing. And like Peek pointed out, I'm not sure how much longer we can tolerate that.

But, every thing else you wrote I agree with. I'm not sure we are actually disagreeing about much of anything here.

Mark Reynolds has had over 500 PA 5 times in his career. 82-80/70-92/65-97/69-93 and last years 93-67, again a year where they couldn't wait to get rid of him, and brought Machado up to an unfamiliar position because he and Betemit where averaging an error like every SEVEN chances, or something silly like that.

And I don't think I know what other people don't. It should be crystal clear that "Mark Reynoldsy" things, aren't gonna help good teams.

By the way, he's a horrible fit in THIS line-up especially. As I mentioned in the spring, strikeouts from individuals are fine - but when you get too many on a TEAM, especially in an offense lacking a stud or two, you're gonna get hit with long peiods of nothing. Right now you got too many guys you wouldn't bet a dime could get a guy home from third with less than two, or move a runner with a productive out. If Reynolds was in a lineup of guys that could handle the bat, but were short on pop, Christ, let him go in there and take his porn hacks - I guess. But here, he just adds to the aggravation.

Hopefully the point is moot, and they get decent production from others, cause "decent" is enough to keep him out of the line-up. If he's in there, that'll tell up about the status of Chizzy and some of the other prospects.

It's a fact that Mark Reynolds has played, and usually started, on mostly winning baseball teams. And it was awfully convenient for you to leave off his rookie year where he played in 111 games and had over 400 AB so you could leave off the 93 win season of Arizona.

And it's also cool that you throw out Machado as if he's some sort of replacement player or something. The dude is a 20 year old phenom 1st round pick Baseball America top 15 prospect for 2 years running. He's not a schmoe who the Orioles settled on because they hated Mark Reynolds so much and were looking for any alternative. Of course, maybe the Orioles should have moved Reynolds over to 1B. Who's the stiff they have over there now?

Mark Reynolds strikes out and hits home runs. That's what he's always done and that's what we expect him to do. And he could absolutely do that on a winning team. The problem is when he stops doing the later of those two things, which, much to our collective consternation, he seems to have stopped doing. And like Peek pointed out, I'm not sure how much longer we can tolerate that.

But, every thing else you wrote I agree with. I'm not sure we are actually disagreeing about much of anything here.

Lotta conjecture.....A dead Man knows how big a prospect Machado was/is. The fact that Reynolds and Betemit were a laughingstock at third precipitated that move - a move that would've waited awhile should Reynolds have been able to do the job. Don't make it sound like 'm making shit up about them squeezing in a scrub.

And you can call 82-80 "winning." But it's just as mediocre, and certainly not "good."

Here's my entire point - his ENTIRE VALUE is the 30 times he hits it over the fence. He does NOTHING else to help a baseball team win - which is why he will find himself on very few GOOD teams. This will all play out, and we can check it out when his storied career is over. Counting his rookie year, I'll set the over/under at two.

I know they don't want to do it, but at some point don't they just have to start putting Aviles over at third base every day and bring up a back-up middle infielder? Depth in the middle infield won't mean a whole lot if they fall out of contention.

Entering today, Reynolds ranked in the top 110 of 490 qualified players in wOBA from 2007-2013, which is the sabermetric equivalent of OPS, so it's more detailed and a more accurate representation of a player's offensive value. By oWAR, Reynolds has two seasons that really stand out, 2009 and 2011. 2013 was trending towards those after April, but he's clearly fallen apart. He's a minus defender, which we already knew, but Chisenhall's ineptitude at the plate forced Francona's hand into putting Reynolds at 3B, which, coincidentally, is when his bat took a major nosedive.

He's actually making more contact this season than his career average. He's chasing quite a bit more than last season and his career average, which is a problem. But his outside-zone contact percentage is up as well. His swing and miss rate is below his career average as well.

Statistically, it's hard to pinpoint exactly what his problem is, except, of course, for the huge spike in strikeouts. His stats all regressed sharply, not gradually like some players do. More than anything, it may just be mental/mechanical. I know I'm going to get the "This is who he is" response, and, yes, that's partially true. But, he's not as bad as he's gone the last eight weeks nor is he as good as he was the first four weeks. He's somewhere in between.

Until he starts walking more and driving some balls, he's well below replacement level.

A God Damn dead man would understand that if a minor league bus in any city took a real sharp right turn, a Zack McCalister would likely fall out. - Lead Pipe

Mark Reynolds has had over 500 PA 5 times in his career. 82-80/70-92/65-97/69-93 and last years 93-67, again a year where they couldn't wait to get rid of him, and brought Machado up to an unfamiliar position because he and Betemit where averaging an error like every SEVEN chances, or something silly like that.

And I don't think I know what other people don't. It should be crystal clear that "Mark Reynoldsy" things, aren't gonna help good teams.

By the way, he's a horrible fit in THIS line-up especially. As I mentioned in the spring, strikeouts from individuals are fine - but when you get too many on a TEAM, especially in an offense lacking a stud or two, you're gonna get hit with long peiods of nothing. Right now you got too many guys you wouldn't bet a dime could get a guy home from third with less than two, or move a runner with a productive out. If Reynolds was in a lineup of guys that could handle the bat, but were short on pop, Christ, let him go in there and take his porn hacks - I guess. But here, he just adds to the aggravation.

Hopefully the point is moot, and they get decent production from others, cause "decent" is enough to keep him out of the line-up. If he's in there, that'll tell up about the status of Chizzy and some of the other prospects.

It's a fact that Mark Reynolds has played, and usually started, on mostly winning baseball teams. And it was awfully convenient for you to leave off his rookie year where he played in 111 games and had over 400 AB so you could leave off the 93 win season of Arizona.

And it's also cool that you throw out Machado as if he's some sort of replacement player or something. The dude is a 20 year old phenom 1st round pick Baseball America top 15 prospect for 2 years running. He's not a schmoe who the Orioles settled on because they hated Mark Reynolds so much and were looking for any alternative. Of course, maybe the Orioles should have moved Reynolds over to 1B. Who's the stiff they have over there now?

Mark Reynolds strikes out and hits home runs. That's what he's always done and that's what we expect him to do. And he could absolutely do that on a winning team. The problem is when he stops doing the later of those two things, which, much to our collective consternation, he seems to have stopped doing. And like Peek pointed out, I'm not sure how much longer we can tolerate that.

But, every thing else you wrote I agree with. I'm not sure we are actually disagreeing about much of anything here.

Lotta conjecture.....A dead Man knows how big a prospect Machado was/is. The fact that Reynolds and Betemit were a laughingstock at third precipitated that move - a move that would've waited awhile should Reynolds have been able to do the job. Don't make it sound like 'm making shit up about them squeezing in a scrub.

And you can call 82-80 "winning." But it's just as mediocre, and certainly not "good."

Here's my entire point - his ENTIRE VALUE is the 30 times he hits it over the fence. He does NOTHING else to help a baseball team win - which is why he will find himself on very few GOOD teams. This will all play out, and we can check it out when his storied career is over. Counting his rookie year, I'll set the over/under at two.

I'm not sure what's conjecture. FWIW Baseball America has Machado's ETA as 2013 for both the last 2 years so some might say he's right on time and it didn't make much sense for the Os to sign Reynolds to a new contract. But whatever.

One thing we can agree on is that neither of us is too thrilled with him dropping turds nightly for our favorite team. If Reynolds makes the playoffs at any time going forward you owe me a beer.

skatingtripods wrote:Entering today, Reynolds ranked in the top 110 of 490 qualified players in wOBA from 2007-2013, which is the sabermetric equivalent of OPS, so it's more detailed and a more accurate representation of a player's offensive value. By oWAR, Reynolds has two seasons that really stand out, 2009 and 2011. 2013 was trending towards those after April, but he's clearly fallen apart. He's a minus defender, which we already knew, but Chisenhall's ineptitude at the plate forced Francona's hand into putting Reynolds at 3B, which, coincidentally, is when his bat took a major nosedive.

He's actually making more contact this season than his career average. He's chasing quite a bit more than last season and his career average, which is a problem. But his outside-zone contact percentage is up as well. His swing and miss rate is below his career average as well.

Statistically, it's hard to pinpoint exactly what his problem is, except, of course, for the huge spike in strikeouts. His stats all regressed sharply, not gradually like some players do. More than anything, it may just be mental/mechanical. I know I'm going to get the "This is who he is" response, and, yes, that's partially true. But, he's not as bad as he's gone the last eight weeks nor is he as good as he was the first four weeks. He's somewhere in between.

Until he starts walking more and driving some balls, he's well below replacement level.

Earlier I wrote I expect him to regress, and that's exactly what I meant. And what that means is I would expect him to improve somewhat to reflect what has been his norm. So, I'm right there with you. JTDC, I sure hope it happens.

Mark Reynolds is a streaky boom or bust player. This shouldn't be a surprise.

July slash line is .136/.000/.136. Not a misprint; 0.000 slugging % (in 21 PA's but Christ). This coming after a June slash of .288/.253/.541.

As for being on winning teams, he's only had a WAR above 2.0 once (44 HR, 223 K season for the D'Backs). He was actually worse than a replacement player for the winning Orioles last year (-0.1 WAR) and the year before (also -0.1 WAR) despite hitting 60 combined HR's.

Last year he was horrible in July, posting a .207/.642 BA/OPS line with 29 K's in 82 AB's.

But he turned it around in August with a .275/.893 with 6 HR's and 13 RBI. Then in September, when the O's were running down the Red Sox, he exploded for 9 HR and 24 RBI.

In April he hit .143 with a staggering 30 K's in 63 AB's. When he's lost at the plate he might as well be up there with a cue stick. But when he's on, well, we saw earlier this year what he can do when he's on.

There's no reason he can't duplicate his 2012 August and September numbers this year. Whether he will or not is the question, but I wouldn't put it past him.

rebelwithoutaclue wrote:Mark Reynolds is a streaky boom or bust player. This shouldn't be a surprise.

July slash line is .136/.000/.136. Not a misprint; 0.000 slugging % (in 21 PA's but Christ). This coming after a June slash of .288/.253/.541.

As for being on winning teams, he's only had a WAR above 2.0 once (44 HR, 223 K season for the D'Backs). He was actually worse than a replacement player for the winning Orioles last year (-0.1 WAR) and the year before (also -0.1 WAR) despite hitting 60 combined HR's.

Considering that WAR takes defense into account, which we all knew he was not good at, I don't look at WAR with Reynolds. I look at oWAR, wOBA, and wRC+. Like I referenced in my post, only in 2009 and 2011 was Reynolds worth significant oWAR. But, every saber offensive stat is predicated on not making outs. He generally has a big gap between average and OBP, but his OBP resides somewhere around average for his position.

It was a calculated gamble that I thoroughly supported that paid off for a month. The alternative was Youkilis and he's on the 60-day DL. If you look at it in that vacuum, at least Reynolds has helped us win some games. The same can't really be said about Youk and the Yanks.

Reynolds has to walk and hit home runs. Right now, he's not doing either one. Adam Dunn turned it around after being putrid for the first two months of the season and now he's a productive player, despite batting .202. These guys are maddeningly frustrating, but they have a purpose.

I'm willing to give him a longer leash, in part because I was a huge supporter of the signing, but also because we've seen what he can do when he gets hot. It's those long droughts in between that are brutal. Maybe he wore down from playing 3B and playing everyday. I don't know.

By wOBA, this season is his outlier. 20 points lower than any other year and 36 lower than his career. As I said above, he's not this bad, nor is he as good as his April was.

A God Damn dead man would understand that if a minor league bus in any city took a real sharp right turn, a Zack McCalister would likely fall out. - Lead Pipe

rebelwithoutaclue wrote:Mark Reynolds is a streaky boom or bust player. This shouldn't be a surprise.

July slash line is .136/.000/.136. Not a misprint; 0.000 slugging % (in 21 PA's but Christ). This coming after a June slash of .288/.253/.541.

As for being on winning teams, he's only had a WAR above 2.0 once (44 HR, 223 K season for the D'Backs). He was actually worse than a replacement player for the winning Orioles last year (-0.1 WAR) and the year before (also -0.1 WAR) despite hitting 60 combined HR's.

Considering that WAR takes defense into account, which we all knew he was not good at, I don't look at WAR with Reynolds. I look at oWAR, wOBA, and wRC+. Like I referenced in my post, only in 2009 and 2011 was Reynolds worth significant oWAR. But, every saber offensive stat is predicated on not making outs. He generally has a big gap between average and OBP, but his OBP resides somewhere around average for his position.

It was a calculated gamble that I thoroughly supported that paid off for a month. The alternative was Youkilis and he's on the 60-day DL. If you look at it in that vacuum, at least Reynolds has helped us win some games. The same can't really be said about Youk and the Yanks.

Reynolds has to walk and hit home runs. Right now, he's not doing either one. Adam Dunn turned it around after being putrid for the first two months of the season and now he's a productive player, despite batting .202. These guys are maddeningly frustrating, but they have a purpose.

I'm willing to give him a longer leash, in part because I was a huge supporter of the signing, but also because we've seen what he can do when he gets hot. It's those long droughts in between that are brutal. Maybe he wore down from playing 3B and playing everyday. I don't know.

By wOBA, this season is his outlier. 20 points lower than any other year and 36 lower than his career. As I said above, he's not this bad, nor is he as good as his April was.

I would argue this is a case in which advanced stats don't reach.

There is striking out, and then there is striking out. We saw this with Branyan as we see with Reynolds.....there are guys that strikeout 100 - 125 times or so, can be in the midst of a slump, and still, with a game depending on it, aren't totally lost causes in putting the bat on the ball to move a runner, or hell just put it in play when it's imperative to do so.

When the Reynolds and Branyans of the world are going throguh their issues, Christ, it don't matter what the situation, they're just gonna hack and hack and hack.

And you can't eliminate defense just because the guy's a zero at it.

Which is to my overall point, the guy can do very little, I would argue about as little as anyone in the league to help your team win. Again, he ain't helpin' your team win AT ANY OTHER TIME save the 30 times he hits a dong. When you consider all that's involved in a season, good teams don't have time to waste wishing one of those incidents comes in a timely fashion, or, more to the reality, 30 incidents ain't enough to make you worth a damn.

Hopefully he gets his 30 this year, and, hopefully the Tribe is fortunate enough to have them come at important times, but your a numbers guy Adam, how do you like the odds?

And one more thing, I think guys like this are really a waste of time against guys that know how to pitch and locate. True, that everyone struggles more against guys like this, but the Reynolds' of the world are lost causes. So, late innings...pennant race games against good teams......gonna have to be really fortunate.

That's nine one-run wins in half a season where Reynolds made an important contribution. To say he's contributing less than any player in the majors to his team's success seems like an exaggeration to me.

I didn't consider the games where Reynolds drove in runs but the Indians won by multiple runs. To be fair, I didn't consider the games where they lost by one run and he went for the collar, either.

I suppose one could argue that if Reynolds was not on the team and Aviles or somebody had been getting all his at-bats, the Tribe still would have won those nine close games, or even a few more. Who knows? But what is undeniable is that he has made a significant contribution to nine wins, and we still have nearly half a season to go. And that's in spite of being in a major slump for about a month.

He had two hits yesterday and went four at-bats without striking out on Sunday. It looks like he might have fixed his problem and be ready to have a decent second half, especially now that Chiz is back, hitting well, and Reynolds doesn't have to play 3rd anymore.

That's nine one-run wins in half a season where Reynolds made an important contribution. To say he's contributing less than any player in the majors to his team's success seems like an exaggeration to me.

I didn't consider the games where Reynolds drove in runs but the Indians won by multiple runs. To be fair, I didn't consider the games where they lost by one run and he went for the collar, either.

I suppose one could argue that if Reynolds was not on the team and Aviles or somebody had been getting all his at-bats, the Tribe still would have won those nine close games, or even a few more. Who knows? But what is undeniable is that he has made a significant contribution to nine wins, and we still have nearly half a season to go. And that's in spite of being in a major slump for about a month.

He had two hits yesterday and went four at-bats without striking out on Sunday. It looks like he might have fixed his problem and be ready to have a decent second half, especially now that Chiz is back, hitting well, and Reynolds doesn't have to play 3rd anymore.

I'm just glad we signed him instead of Youkilis.

Never said he was contributing less that any player in the league. I have no earthly idea, haven't looked it up. I said he does as little as anyone in the league - because his ability is extremely limited to one thing. (And yes, I get the walks, but in this day and age there's a pretty good chance Reynold's replacement in drawing walks as well)

And your answering your own question about someone in the line-up replacing him. Christ, bring Marte back, play him 162, and count the games he knocked in two that they won by two or less. Your sure to find them. Doesn't mean he A. Still doesn't stink and B. Anyone on GGE would've done the same or better.

And poor guy....doesn't have to play third now......this exaggerates my point even more - if you are going to be an absolute cipher, save your hitting, you better H-I-T. Not allegedly "salvage" your second half by getting your average to .235 and drawing a few more walks.

I gotta headache, you guys tell me again how a DH that ain't a good hitter helps any team.

leadpipe wrote:Which is to my overall point, the guy can do very little, I would argue about as little as anyone in the league to help your team win. Again, he ain't helpin' your team win AT ANY OTHER TIME save the 30 times he hits a dong. When you consider all that's involved in a season, good teams don't have time to waste wishing one of those incidents comes in a timely fashion, or, more to the reality, 30 incidents ain't enough to make you worth a damn.

Pretty damn good at bat yesterday against Rondon to yank that 101 mph pitch into LF for a hit. Should have started the game winning rally, but we fucked that all up. I've seen signs of him coming out of it. Some good takes in the box, some quality at bats ending in bad results.

I'm a sample size guy, so I know that one at bat doesn't mean shit, but it's at least a positive sign and maybe something for him to build on.

Hopefully he gets his 30 this year, and, hopefully the Tribe is fortunate enough to have them come at important times, but your a numbers guy Adam, how do you like the odds?

The stats don't tell of a guy due for regression or improvement. Over this horrible stretch, his BABIP is about where it should be, so it's not like he's getting unlucky on balls in play. A lot of his stats fall pretty close to his career numbers, since April was great and everything else wasn't.

Like I've already said...he's better than the last two months and not as good as April. So the odds of him falling in between should be pretty good. His body language is telling. He looks like he's lost. No confidence whatsoever. When he does get a pitch to hit, he's fouling it back or popping it up.

We'll see. I think he's got a run left in him, but that may just be me salvaging the flag I planted on the ship that's sinking.

A God Damn dead man would understand that if a minor league bus in any city took a real sharp right turn, a Zack McCalister would likely fall out. - Lead Pipe

That's nine one-run wins in half a season where Reynolds made an important contribution. To say he's contributing less than any player in the majors to his team's success seems like an exaggeration to me.

I didn't consider the games where Reynolds drove in runs but the Indians won by multiple runs. To be fair, I didn't consider the games where they lost by one run and he went for the collar, either.

I suppose one could argue that if Reynolds was not on the team and Aviles or somebody had been getting all his at-bats, the Tribe still would have won those nine close games, or even a few more. Who knows? But what is undeniable is that he has made a significant contribution to nine wins, and we still have nearly half a season to go. And that's in spite of being in a major slump for about a month.

He had two hits yesterday and went four at-bats without striking out on Sunday. It looks like he might have fixed his problem and be ready to have a decent second half, especially now that Chiz is back, hitting well, and Reynolds doesn't have to play 3rd anymore.

I'm just glad we signed him instead of Youkilis.

Now go back and find all the 1-run loss games where Reynolds went 0-4 to balance out your cherry-picking.

leadpipe wrote:Which is to my overall point, the guy can do very little, I would argue about as little as anyone in the league to help your team win. Again, he ain't helpin' your team win AT ANY OTHER TIME save the 30 times he hits a dong. When you consider all that's involved in a season, good teams don't have time to waste wishing one of those incidents comes in a timely fashion, or, more to the reality, 30 incidents ain't enough to make you worth a damn.

Pretty damn good at bat yesterday against Rondon to yank that 101 mph pitch into LF for a hit. Should have started the game winning rally, but we fucked that all up. I've seen signs of him coming out of it. Some good takes in the box, some quality at bats ending in bad results.

I'm a sample size guy, so I know that one at bat doesn't mean shit, but it's at least a positive sign and maybe something for him to build on.

Hopefully he gets his 30 this year, and, hopefully the Tribe is fortunate enough to have them come at important times, but your a numbers guy Adam, how do you like the odds?

The stats don't tell of a guy due for regression or improvement. Over this horrible stretch, his BABIP is about where it should be, so it's not like he's getting unlucky on balls in play. A lot of his stats fall pretty close to his career numbers, since April was great and everything else wasn't.

Like I've already said...he's better than the last two months and not as good as April. So the odds of him falling in between should be pretty good. His body language is telling. He looks like he's lost. No confidence whatsoever. When he does get a pitch to hit, he's fouling it back or popping it up.

We'll see. I think he's got a run left in him, but that may just be me salvaging the flag I planted on the ship that's sinking.

Well, if you're gonna cherry pick at bats, you might want to get the bat on the ball in the second with two guys on.....

Again, it's not what he does when he gets his hits - few and far between as they are, it's what he does with the entire rest of his baseball existence when he doesn't - which is absolutely nothing.

Of course he'll be better than the last month or so, I'm just not sure that's anything to be excited about.